Feeling Frustration Of Welfare

Lake Officials Get A Taste Of Life As Public Aid Recipient

On a typical Monday morning, Lake County State`s Atty. Michael Waller spends time in his Waukegan office preparing for the week.

But this past Monday, Waller took on the role of a 7-year-old boy living in poverty, skipping meals and school to accompany his frustrated, unemployed mother through the public aid process.

Waller was among about 65 Lake County leaders who attended a welfare simulation program at the College of Lake County in Grayslake to get a taste of what it would be like to live on welfare in Illinois.

The simulation, cosponsored by the Lake County Coalition for the Homeless and the Lake County Human Services Council, was designed to sensitize participants to the frustrations experienced by welfare recipients.

``Welcome to the state of poverty,`` said Eddye Owen, director of Women for Economic Security, as she explained what would follow during the next two hours to a room full of mayors, county officials and social service workers.

The group was divided into clusters of ``poverty-stricken families`` with each family member assigned a role to play. Waller played the son of a single mother ironically named ``Mrs. Jolly,`` who also had a 4-year-old asthmatic child to care for.

Equipped only with a folder containing sketchy instructions, a welfare check and food stamps, the mother, who had never been employed, was expected to feed and clothe her children and pay rent, utility bills and other outstanding debts for one month, condensed into one hour during the simulation.

Tables were set up representing the public aid office, grocery store, pawn shop, church, bank and other places where welfare recipients might go. Like the real process, the Jollys bounced from table to table trying to get assistance.

Waller, who was expected to behave like a 7-year-old, repeatedly whined about being hungry and occasionally quipped, ``Mom, why ain`t I in school?``

Often, the family was met with rude clerks who demanded transportation passes before providing any assistance. The passes represented the lack of car fare provided for public aid recipients.

By the end of the simulation, the Jollys, like other families who got lost in the confusion, did not eat during the first ``two weeks`` of the exercise and accumulated many debts by evading bill collectors.

Waller and his ``younger brother`` were on the verge of being sent to a foster home because of their mother`s neglect.

During a debriefing period, participants assessed the welfare system as a frustrating process that at times pushed honest and vulnerable people to lie, cheat and steal.

Gail Daley, a prevention specialist with the Northern Illinois Council of Alcohol and Substance Abuse, said, ``You really have a feeling like you`re prone to violence. The frustration level is so high.``

Pat Wadsworth of Family Services Board/South Lake County played a 15-year-old trying to help her down-and-out family cope. ``I felt like stealing in the grocery store. After three weeks of hunger, I might have,``

she said.

Another family confessed to selling a baby to make ends meet.

But Owen said that contrary to those stereotypes, most welfare recipients exhaust all means before turning to dishonesty to survive. And others learn how to work the system.

``You don`t feel good about doing this, but this is what you have to do to survive,`` Owen said.

In Lake County, the Department of Public Aid in January provided cash assistance to 3,018 families, most of them composed of one adult and two children; provided food stamps to 6,006 households; and medical assistance to 10,764 homes.

``I don`t think you can realistically simulate what it`s like to be on welfare. But at least it gets us through it and shows us how it could easily become frustrating,`` Waller said.

A grandson of a superintendent of public aid in another county, Waller said he is familiar with the paradox welfare programs present.

``You want to make it accessible, but at the same time you don`t want people to take advantage,`` he said.